He was dressed like Hunter S. Thompson… even had the silly cigarette holder (unlighted ciggie, of course, he was on a public bus, remember)
Usually the Iraq vets I meet on the bus and can immediately tell are vets are the ones with the Walter Reed hardware attached to what’s left of their limbs.
This guy didn’t have pieces missing, not that immediately showed.
He was just short of cryin’ drunk, or phasing from fightin’ drunk to “cryin’ about yer daddy drunk”. Mentioned that he had just got back, two tours of duty there but he survived, dammit, he’s still alive…
said he hates the country but still fought for it.
Offered me a cigarette… on the bus offered me a cigarette…
Said he managed to get out with a Dishonorable Discharge for drug use. That DD part is important, but let me get through the rambling part of the story first, m’kay?
Another Iraq vet called him “Hunter” and he said “Yeah, I know, he was one of my favorites too” and mentioned a couple of movies of Thompson’s work… and that he was “over there” when Gonzo blew his brains out.
Kind of a time warp thingie, that both of them had, they identified the time of his suicide as “last year”. It’s Important, so pay attention…
After the Hunter guy gets off the bus, the other made some teasing remark… I said, yeah, it’s a clear case of PTSD (it was, too…)
He said, “yeah, you’re right, that’s what the VA is treating me for” important …
I mentioned my brother-in-law Al, who came back from the Nam with both PTSD and Malaria..
He softly whistles and says “damn, that’s a helluva combination” and I was getting off the bus right then.
Here’s where all the things stack together, the stuff I tagged as Important.
Drug use is a major symptom of PTSD. So is legalized drug use like alcohol. So is a time warp of three years.
I wasn’t goint to mention the Hunter S. deal to him, when somebody’s at that stage of drunk any suggestion of suicide is dangerous.
But they gave him a Dishonorable after two tours of duty in Iraq.
For exhibiting a symptom of PTSD.
The guy who mentioned that he was being treated by the VA, I didn’t have the time to remind him, the Hunter S. guy, said he had a Dishonorable.
NO medical treatment even for something that’s service related or, in this case, actually CAUSED by his service.
There’s a deal the VVAW and IVAW people have mentioned, that the Pentagoons are deliberately culling people with PTSD as “Disciplinary” or “behavioral” problems, even Dishonorable Discharges, precisely for that reason.
They broke them, but they don’t want to pay to fix them.
But that’s just a “Lefty Conspiracy theory”, right?
One in Four Homeless are vets. A Dishonorable Discharge disqualifies you for veterans’ benefits and ruins your job prospects. These veterans get out, can’t get a job and can’t get medical treatment because they can’t get a job…too bad for you veteran!
Dear MS SwissMissTress, So you understand a D.D. is not
given for fun. To get that means you have not & will not
respond to command help. Also keep in mind, sadly, the
military is accepting far too many losers in the service as it
is. Most of these D.D. were losers BEFORE service.
Todays vets are getting better service in the VA and
military hospitals. But far to many want to be “PTSD”
labeled. Why? Honey, money – money – money. No one
wants to downplay war. Sure it is not fun but fact of life.
So is a car crash or some other way one can get hurt.
Give you the right to PTSD? Do keep in mind that far too
many losers were allowed into the Army in the first place.
Sad they did not overcome their mental problems, many do
and go on to make productive soldiers & then civilians. But
the name of the game now is PTSD. Money – money – money,
honey. WWII guys were gone up to 5 years and did not
come back PTSD. Why was that. No one gave money for
such a joke. General Patton had the right idea. Kick in
the Ass. Back to duty and go on. So many of our boys
have lost their b–ls, then PTSD looks good. Sad state we
are in. Hope your trip to those liberal social commie land is
soon.
your favoright neocon retired combat vet,
George
Maybe you just haven’t learned Consciousness issues deeply enough.
PTSD is as old as war, made worse when conditions of war came to the way they are now, that would have been, like, at the time of the American Civil War and the British/Prussian/Russian/Turkish Crimean War.
PTSD isn’t caused by pre-existing mental conditions.
That’s something even the military concedes. (Patton slapping a kid for breaking down notwithstanding… the kid wasn’t brought out of it by being assaulted)
Major, there was a startling statistic released last month, more than half of the diagnosed/ruled/reported suicides in America last year were Iraq vets.
That’s pretty damned bad. Were all those who committed suicide “losers”? I don’t think so.
I remember Basic Training, Major. When the same techniques were used by the Nazis and the Soviets and the Communist Chinese and the North Koreans, it was called “brainwashing”.
The most polite term for it is “Pavlovian Conditioning”.
I do understand, you know, that the reason the military does it that way, is valid, BUT only valid if you accept the notion that war is a necessity.
In Boot Camp it’s done so the soldier can perform his “duties” without the overwhelming guilt that the conditions of war would impose on somebody who is essentially moral, normal and psychologically stable.
The condition regimen itself has a casualty rate, even before a single shot is fired, even before the soldier is required to go against the laws of Man and God and kill…
something like 3 out of every 200 soldiers attempt suicide in the first weeks of Basic Training.
6 out of every 100 “wash out” of Basic Training. Then they’re called “losers” because the Army/Navy/Air Force/Marines failed to indoctrinate them.
Most people are resistant to indoctrination, that’s the reason for the brainwashing.
It’s also the reason so many of them cannot be brainwashed permanently.
Sooner or later, usually after they leave the soldier leaves the service, leaves the constant reinforcement of the brainwashing, and he regains more control of his own actions and his own mind, a large percentage of them are overwhelmed by the evil they have been compelled to commit.
There’s no fixed ratio for that last statistic, as more is being learned of the devastating effects, especially as more ex-soldiers are kept alive longer through advanced medicine, like geriatrics, the symptoms keep popping up.
And the longer one lives, the more likely it is that the PTSD will catch up to him.
The difference in the rates of PTSD diagnoses between World War 1 Veterans and the current newly discharged veterans, is exactly that, the percentage of Diagnoses.
Not a difference in the rate of occurence.
Your own bitterness and hatred of your former comrades who have succumbed to wound you can’t see, did you know, Major, that too is a symptom of PTSD.
It’s a system designed with a fatal flaw, several in fact.
How’s your physical health, Major?
Is there money in being homeless, too, Major Hutton, since one in four homeless is a veteran? Perhaps there’s money in offing yourself too, if you are a vet. It might be nice if you could put your right-wing ideolgy aside and care about your American brothers and sisters. Instead you just stump for the your corporate paymasters who are bankrupting us all. That’s real American! I am leaving soon because it’s getting harder and harder for hard-working Americans to eak out a middle class lifestyle. But you wouldn’t know that because you’ve been handed your middle-class lifestyle on a platter by the government…that’s not conservative, that’s easy. So of course you need to be vitrolic in your defense of the system that pays your bills and give you health care lest you have to admit to being a hypocrit. This is all based on my assumption that you are, in fact, a Major, probably in the Air Force, right? They are the worst in defending the system and the violence inherent in it. Army folks tend to have a humility about it all, but not the Air Force.
What would be the economic benefit of being disabled, especially if you are not allowed to access the necessary health care?
I gather from Eric’s description, that you bully other Vets, especially (just from your own words and catch phrases) those who are disabled and most especially those who left their soul in Iraq or maybe at Lackland or Ft Bliss or Ft Leonard Wood…
Do you use the keywords drilled into us all during Basic? You certainly did in your writing. Do you do it because you’re incapable of thinking any other way, or do you do it coldly and with calculated precision the way the TI’s do it? Kind of Psychological Warfare against Americans.
Major, can you justify those kinds of actions without using those keywords, those concepts which were repeated to us so often that they seem (ed) to be Truth?
Also, Major, I asked about your physical health because so many of the problems affecting people who are no longer in service, are psychosomatic.
That doesn’t mean they aren’t real, it just means the consciousness at some level has made them real.
The treatment for them is different than putting a bandage on an open wound or putting a splint on a broken limb. But it is VALID medical treatment, for very Real Physical disorders.
You might want to look into that, rather than assuming the problems are merely symptoms of advancing age.
Your assertion that Shell Shock > Combat Fatigue > PTSD didn’t exist before VietNam shows you have never researched the problem.
Your Military has. That’s why, when you were in the Nam, they had R&R.
It was a stopgap effort to address a problem they recognized, and were concerned therefore.
It also didn’t work very well.
Another thing that doesn’t work AT ALL is denial of the problem.
If you do have your CHAMPVA benefits, I would suggest you avail yourself of the programs in existence.